


Inside, Outside

by fadedskylines



Category: Luke Cage (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Defenders (Marvel TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Fix-It, Luke Cage S2 spoilers, Multi, i know the summary sounds depressing as hell but i promise this is a fix-it, no one dies...not on my watch!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-04
Updated: 2018-08-04
Packaged: 2019-06-21 12:19:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15557565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fadedskylines/pseuds/fadedskylines
Summary: This is life without Darius. And it should feel a little warmer, because Hernan was without Darius for years, years of Diamondback and Cottonmouth and hovering around Mariah.But it feels different this time.





	Inside, Outside

**Author's Note:**

> In this fic, the massacre at Gwen's happens before Comanche gets outed as a snitch.

INSIDE WAS INSIDE.

When Comanche first gets out of Seagate, Shades is thrown back into a flurry of memories involving Seagate, cold prison cells, and robbing a poor Coney Island hot dog vendor. When they hug, he remembers all the other times Che had hugged him, to include when he got stood up at prom-which prompted them to sneak into a 21 and older bar-and when they first arrived at Seagate-prompted by yet another crime, but much more serious and resultant of a stronger lapse in judgement. At least Diamondback was gone now. He also remembers all the times he hugged up on Che in their little cell, the dark nights when he listened to Che’s heartbeat like it was a lullaby to help him fall asleep.

When Che releases him from his embrace, he takes a step back and looks Hernan up and down.

“So you wearing these still, huh?” Che brings a hand up to tap the side of Shades’ sunglasses. They slip down the bridge of his nose a little and he readjusts them.

“Yeah.” Shades looks away, belatedly realizing that Che can’t actually see his eyes move. “Everybody's caught on to calling me Shades now ‘cause I wear ‘em so much.”

“Shades,” Che laughs. “Yeah. I can get used to hearing everyone else say it.”

“I’m still the same guy, though.” Shades starts walking towards his car, and Che follows. “Just with a cooler name now.”

Che’s sliding into the passenger’s seat when he responds, cool as can be while looking out the window.

“I think Hernan is a cool name.”

Sometimes, Shades doesn’t like hearing everyone use the name “Shades” all that much. Mariah dropped the nickname eventually, and it made her seem exponentially more fine to him. He especially dislikes his nickname, however, now that Darius is around. Darius knew him before he even put on his first pair of sunglasses, back when he didn’t even know the English word for “sunglasses”. Darius probably even taught him how to say it, and Hernan probably taught him how to say “cabron” or “chinga tu madre” in return. Hernan always did shit like that, telling himself that maybe Darius would need it one day.

He takes one last glance at Darius, unable to think of a response witty enough to be said, and takes off.

* * *

WHEN YOU’RE AT COLLEGE, IT FEELS REAL.

It’s kind of strange that they don’t address it, what went down between them at Seagate. Hernan can tell from the way Darius looks at him and the way he stares Mariah down that it didn’t just evaporate from Darius’ mind when he got out. Hernan tells himself that it’s just different; for Darius, their fits of kisses and secret hand-holding was just a plane ride ago. For Hernan, it’s been years. He’s lived in this new world, _his_ new world, one without Darius, for years now.

His new world is under the rule of a queen, a beautiful and demanding queen, and he doesn’t regret it.

His queen’s kissing him and telling him to go after Arturo Rey when he feels it, the sensation that someone was watching him. He breaks away to kiss Mariah’s forehead when he sees Darius out of the corner of his eye, looking at them like he’d lost his whole world.

And he did.

The thought makes Hernan sick somehow, so he leaves Mariah with another kiss and the tossing-back of a glass of rum.

* * *

WHEN YOU GRADUATE, YOU GROW UP.

Hernan is tossing the gun he used to shoot Arturo Rey under Manhattan bridge when a memory flickers into his mind. It’s pre-Seagate, a quiet night just like this one where the excitement of the next move lingered over his head like a racehorse carrot.

_Diamondback had him and Darius stakeout this low-level pier by Manhattan Bridge that the Diablos were pushing ice through. Nothing ever happened that night, but since Hernan is one of the most indecisive bastards he knows, he made Darius sit with him until the crack of dawn just to make sure no one was gonna show up._

_“Shit’s been quiet all night,” Darius leaned back against the lone streetlamp that lit up the pier. “I don’t think any Diablos are hanging around.”_

_“I know, but what if they do show up eventually?” Hernan asked. “I don’t wanna be here all night either, but we gotta secure all the exits.”_

_Darius just shrugged. A moment of silence passed between them before Hernan finally spoke up again._

_“What do you think we should do?”_

_Darius considered the question for a few seconds before he barked out a laugh. “I think we should go. I don’t think anyone’s coming, but you’re the one in charge, b. Diamondback said that.”_

_Hernan didn’t respond, so Darius took it as an opportunity to continue._

_“Hernan. You gotta take charge sometimes, you know. You got the brains for it,” Darius shook his head. “You can always see the future; you’re like ten steps ahead of what your enemy can see. So use that brain of yours and decide what you think we should do.”_

_Hernan couldn’t think of any decent response to that, so he just coughed and said, “What, you on some Art of War shit now?”_

_He knew that Darius could tell this was his way of deflecting attention away from him. He’d known him long enough to know that it always ticked Darius off when Hernan wouldn’t make the decisions he was more than capable of making, even if he never let it show. Darius never argued with Hernan about it, and he wouldn’t this time._

_“Yeah, maybe,” Darius humored him. “I paid enough attention in World History to learn a thing or two."_

_“Shut up, Darius.” Hernan laughed._

_They went on to sit there the whole night, even though Hernan never quite made a decision about what they should or shouldn’t have done. Darius still sat with him though, and he even pretended not to notice when Hernan started nodding off._

_He never knew why Darius always waited for him._

The tide starts to look a little high when Hernan snaps out of it. He grabs his sunglasses that are hanging off his shirt collar and snaps them back on.

He’s driving back to Harlem’s Paradise when he starts to realize why Darius always waited. He feels something bubble in his chest, but he can’t quite place what it is.

 

* * *

TIME REVEALS ALL.

About a week has passed when Mariah decides it’s time to sell some guns to the Yardies. Hernan hasn’t thought about Seagate much, or at least he’s tried not to, and he manages to keep his voice level whenever he’s one-on-one with Darius. He keeps making comments about Mariah, how she’s sucking the soul out of Hernan-and other things for that matter-and how she keeps pushing him around like he’s some lackey. It isn’t really like that though, and that’s what Hernan always tells him. They’re business partners and another kind of partners, too. All at the same time.

It’s part of why he feels like a compass geared towards Mariah whenever they’re together. She’s true north. She doesn’t take every piece of advice Hernan gives her, but he loves that too. He loves how she can listen to him and not agree with a damn thing he said, but he also loves how, deep inside, she gets a sense of reassurance from his words. He always feels clever and witty around her, even when he knows he’s not being anything of the sort.

She complements him in that way, but even he knows that their business partner status precedes all else.

He starts to feel an ache in his chest when Mariah begins to ignore that and shouts at him to go strike a deal with the Yardies.

“C’mon, you don’t wanna be ‘Shades’ forever,” she says, the New Yorker accent starting to come out like it always does when she starts to get irritated. Hernan used to think it was endearing, the way she tried to hide it in the public eye, but it seems to be more like a warning sign as of late.

He sighs. The sound makes Mariah soften, though only a bit, and she leans back on her desk. “Don’t you wanna be ‘Hernan’ again?”

Hernan thinks about how he never really stopped being Hernan, and how he never really became “Shades”. “I wanna get out just as bad as you.”

“So get a move on.” Mariah straightens out her back. Whatever softened in her hardens up again. She’s staring Hernan down like he’s some roadblock in her way, and she always does that even though she knows he’s always on her side. “You standin’ around here like the deal’s just gonna make itself. Tell them rassclaats we ain’t giving this shit up for free. You wanna get out, then get your ass _out_.”

Something about that makes Hernan snap. Maybe it has to do with the way she says it, or the way she looks at him when she does, but Hernan’s definitely sure that it’s got to do with the disrespect in her words.

“Who are you talking to like that?” He takes a few steps forward, just to show off the couple inches he has over Mariah. “I’m not your bodyguard. I’m your partner.”

Mariah rolls her eyes and motions towards the door, unbothered by the heat in his voice. “A partner is as a partner does.”

“You gotta listen to your partner, and you know that. ‘Cause if you’d just sold that fucking painting and gave me Harlem’s Paradise, you wouldn’t have to be doing business with the Yardies,” he snaps back.

“I’m not selling the goddamn painting.” She grabs the glass of bushmaster rum beside her and holds it tight. “And I’m not getting into more of this…shit with you, not right now.”

That icy stare is back, and no matter how hard he looks into her eyes, he can’t find a trace of those embers he saw back when she had thrown Cornell out the window. Her eyes are pitch black now. Hernan wonders if the fire burned out a long time ago and if he just never noticed.

He’s standing there, dumbfounded and unsure of what to say, when Tilda walks in. She looks hesitant, especially when she glances at him. He feels like an outsider whenever she’s around, like he’s just another fool passing through her mother’s life, watching them from behind a glass window and wishing he could feel the way that they’re feeling. The ache in his chest is back and he finally walks away.

He’s driving to Brooklyn when he remembers that he’s always been Mariah’s best listener. In fact, he’s always been a good listener in general. Mariah would tell him that sometimes, on dark nights in her quiet boudoir, holding him tight and whispering that she loves how good he is at following her every move.

Darius had told him that too once, in a way that Hernan can’t seem to forget.

_It’s one of the most vivid memories he has of his time at Seagate, when he was pissed for no real good reason. He still can’t remember what it even was, maybe Lucas just looked at him or Darius funny, but he knows he was punching walls like he could break through them if he punched hard enough. His knuckles bled and the guards let him be, but he couldn’t stop the cloud of anger that was fogging up his brain. It was a moment or two before lights out when Darius finally came into their shared cell and pulled him away from the wall, far too gentle for the fit Hernan was having. So Darius pulled harder, damn near ripping Hernan’s jumpsuit in the process, and pushed him towards their bunks._

_Hernan doesn’t remember everything Darius was saying then, just sporadic bursts of “you better” do this and “shut the hell up before I” do that. It was Darius’ way of calming him, and he hadn’t done anything like that since they were in junior high or some far-off time like that, so Hernan hadn’t realized just how much it worked. He was too busy watching how fast Darius’ mouth moved and the way his eyebrows furrowed over and over to think about whatever it was that got him so riled up in the first place. It was like Darius was beating him into submission without even breaking a sweat._

_“You gonna say something about how your hands look like they got ran over or are you just gonna keep looking at me like you’re stupid?” Darius was pissed, pissed that he hurt himself and pissed that he’d been doing it for so long._

_Hernan knew he was a great listener. He knew it because he loved the way Darius sounded, and especially right then, with the way he sounded like he was seconds away from throwing Hernan back into the wall._

_He loved it because he knew Darius wasn’t going to. He’d never hurt Hernan like that._

_So that night, when Hernan had settled down, he whispered for Darius to try. He felt embarrassed and, of all things, shitty for asking, but he should’ve known better. He should’ve known Darius wouldn’t, he wouldn’t even grip Hernan’s hip too hard or leave a single bruise on his neck, and he should’ve known Darius would be an asshole and be as gentle as he could, just to drive him crazy._

_Hernan was starting to get pissed and was on the verge of pushing Darius away so he could finish himself off, but then he saw these embers in Darius’ eyes, like it was taking all the effort in the world to not give in to Hernan’s request. The embers of not giving Hernan what he asked for; the embers of making him beg for it. The embers of making Hernan take whatever Darius gave him._

_He’d never felt a fire so hot in his life._

Hernan starts gripping the steering wheel so tight that his knuckles whiten. He’s always loved being a good listener, for Mariah especially, but no one has ever known exactly how to get him to shut up and give in like Darius does.

The thought makes the ache in his chest finally fade away.

* * *

I AIN’T DIFFERENT.

There’s a snitch.

Hernan knows this, particularly because Mariah told him as much, but it hurts more to admit it than it does to realize the danger he’s in because of it. He knows he can go back to Seagate. It’ll be a lonelier sentence to serve, and a much colder cell this time around, but he can still go back.

But he can’t go back on his word to Darius. So how did Darius go back on his word to Hernan?

Hernan’s counting to ten in his head over and over and trying not to think of old stakeout memories as he watches the scene splayed out before him. The pier is empty and quiet, save for the soft sound of loafers scraping along the concrete. A man has his hands in his pocket, probably to keep hold of his strap, as he faces the water. It’s the police chief and, amusingly, Mariah’s old flame: Ridenhour. Hernan has seen him a few times over the course of his business with Harlem’s Paradise.

Though it seems that business is almost over now.

Darius is seeing to its end as he frantically storms over to Ridenhour, worry in his eyes.

“He knows.” He’s starting to pace back and forth, and Hernan still feels the urge to tell him to calm the hell down even when he knows that Darius is talking about him. “He admitted to me that he saw Mariah kill Cottonmouth.”

Hernan sucks in a sharp breath. It’s strange to hear Darius putting their personal conversations out in the open for a fucking cop, of all people, to see, and it’s even stranger because Hernan knows this isn’t the first time Darius has done it. All the shit he’s told him has been exposed to Ridenhour’s ears. It hurts in a way that makes him almost embarrassed of all the earnestness he’d shown Darius, because he’d trusted him and loved him, and Hernan starts to think it hurts so bad because he _still_ loves him. It’s a startling thought, but it’s one that makes him snap back to the conversation going on in front of him.

“She goes away for life, right?” Darius has this look on his face, and even though he’s not speaking quietly by any means, it’s a soft and weary expression. The same one he wore when he saw Hernan kiss Mariah for the first time.

The cop isn’t hearing none of it, and before he can tell Darius some bullshit about the boundaries of whatever deal he’s struck, Hernan decides it’s time to come out.

He watches Darius jump and pull his gun on Ridenhour, mumbling something about him being the guy Sugar was snitching to. It makes Hernan want to laugh, because they can’t lie to each other, never for long enough, and how strange it is to be on the receiving end of such a flimsy lie. Ridenhour starts freaking out and telling Hernan about how he can get him immunity too, but Darius pistol whips him and knocks him out before he can finish his spiel.

The thud of Ridenhour’s body hitting the ground echoes out into the distance and ushers a silence in between the two men. Darius is still breathing heavy, he never really stopped since he got here, and Hernan is looking anywhere but at the unconscious man before him.

“I was doing it to get Mariah locked up,” Darius is the one to finally break the silence, his voice a tiny whisper. “You were gonna get out just fine.”

“So why’d you knock him out when he was talking about giving me an immunity deal?” Hernan can’t hide the ugly pain of betrayal from his voice.

Darius’ face twists up. “I wanna explain myself to you,” he pauses. “Just you.”

“You didn’t have to knock him out for that. You’re just gonna tell him later, aren’t you?” Hernan laughs. “Every time I talked to you, I was just talking to an open fucking line for Ridenhour.”

“And every time I talked to _you_ , it was an open line for Mariah.” Darius retorts, and anger’s starting to tinge his words. “Talkin’ about some ‘Rivals, we ain’t got none’. You were kissing our rival all along, and you couldn’t even recognize that!”

 “But this isn’t about that-“

“Bullshit it isn’t about that,” Darius starts.

“It isn’t!” Hernan snaps. “This is about how you been airing out all our business to Ridenhour. You could’ve told me, you know that! I trusted you, Darius.”

“But you trusted Mariah more,” Darius says, his voice growing quiet. “I told you already. I did what I did to save you. You could’ve got all of Mariah’s shit when she got locked up. You could’ve decided what to do with it yourself. If I told you about my plan, you wouldn’t have even thought about it ‘cause you were blinded by your love for her.”

The words take Hernan aback as he starts to realize how long it’s been since Mariah actually had that much of a hold on him. Hernan thinks about all the times Mariah pushed him to the side or, worse, went off on him directly, and how every time he couldn’t stop thinking about how Darius would never treat him like that, how Darius could yell at him but only because he cared about him, how Darius would listen to what he had to say, how Darius would follow him to the end of the earth if he asked.

But then he thinks about how Darius is kind and has so much to offer the world, and he’s so close to finally being out of the game because of his deal with Ridenhour. Hernan would be an asshole to tell him the truth of the matter and ask him to stay back and wait for him. He could just speak his truth and run away from Harlem with Darius, but he knows deep in his heart that that isn’t the right choice to make. Not now.

In the few beats of silence Darius gives him, he decides to stick around until Mariah is finally in prison. Hernan knows he’s the best key they can use to lock her up.

It’s a peculiar choice for someone as self-concerned as he is, but he decides on it in a matter of seconds. He isn’t an angel, and he knows that, but he can’t let Mariah go on and kill innocent people like Anansi and, potentially, Ingrid. He can’t let her bring an end to the rules that people like him and Darius had abided by their whole lives, even if it ends up killing him. He reasons that he’s not an angel, so better him than someone who is, like Ingrid.

He looks up at Darius.

“I loved Mariah.” Hernan concedes. “But I got into this mess because I was blinded by how much I love you.”

It’s Darius’ turn to fall silent. It makes Hernan’s chest ache again and he finally gives up the hope that the feeling will ever go away.

“I thought if I could get out, and get out clean, there’d be a possibility of us being us again.” Hernan glances at Ridenhour. He’ll probably come to soon. “But I’m indecisive. I’m always scared to act on my instincts, and I never really know why. But right now, I’m choosing to stick around here in Harlem and make sure all of Mariah’s assets disappear. She’s already lost control of half her shit, and I’m not tryna be at her side when she loses the other half. I can take an immunity deal and get her locked up, but you can’t be with me when I do.”

Darius gives him a questioning look.

Hernan continues. “I take an immunity deal and I live with the risk of getting murked here in Harlem by one of Mariah’s other men-but I can live with that.”

He looks Darius right in the eyes. “But I can’t live knowing I’m putting you at risk, too.”

“It’s us, man,” Darius says. “We gotta take the risk together. We always do.”

“We’re not going to this time.” Hernan sighs. “When Ridenhour gets up, finesse your way out of the whole assault on an officer thing. Make him take you back to the station and get witness protection or something and tell him everything you know. Everything I told you.”

Darius raises an eyebrow.

“You’ve got my blessing this time,” Hernan clarifies. “I was too dumb to give it to you before, you were right about that. So you tell him everything you know and get out of New York as soon as possible.”

“I’m not leaving you here-“

Ridenhour starts moving. Hernan’s getting ready to go.

“Then _I_ gotta leave you here.” Hernan says, and he says it with such finality that Darius can’t find it in him to respond. “I’d say ‘see you next time’ or some shit but there better not be a next time, ok?” He can feel his voice starting to break and he’s trying to keep it together and be funny about the whole thing, but it feels so much more real now that he’s letting himself admit that Darius’ only shot at a good life is a life without him.

“Get out of New York, Darius.” Hernan reaffirms. “Don’t stick around because it probably won’t end up good for you-and if you go looking for me, it definitely won’t be. Plus I,” he falters, “I probably won’t be around that much longer anyway. I just gotta make sure Mariah’s put down first.”

And it’s the most heroic shit he’s ever said, even if it was said right before he took off running to his car and tears were threatening to slip down his face all the while. But he forces himself to smile on the way to Harlem’s Paradise, because the last memory Darius will have of him will be one where he’s brave and doing the right thing for once-and finally, _finally_ taking charge.

* * *

INSIDE OR OUTSIDE.

Hernan storms into Mariah’s office with all the courage in the world. He walks in like he’s really about to do something, his fists are all curled too, but then he comes face-to-face with Mariah, who’s drunk and holding onto a wineglass in one hand and Alex in the other like they’re both lifelines. She looks like the shell of the woman she used to be and it almost makes Hernan feel bad for her.

Alex storms out once his panic sets in and, as strange as it is, Hernan doesn’t feel any anger towards him in that moment. Something in him still craves the Mariah he stumbled upon when she bashed Cottonmouth’s head in, but all of him has come to terms with the fact that that’s simply not her anymore. She’s a different person now.

So he means it, and it doesn’t even hurt, when he calls her a crazy ass bitch. And he was so close to leaving it at that, so close to leaving Mariah for good, when she brings Che up. It makes him falter, so much so that he steps away from the door and he’s breathing so hard he starts feeling like he’s having one of his old Seagate fits.

It isn’t until she says asks him if they were just “gay for the stay” or if it was a “true brokeback romance” that his body comes to an agreement, that shit’s going down and it’s going down now.

“I should’ve let him bleed out slow,” she says. “And you could watch.”

Hernan lunges at her, his hands flying to her neck and squeezing on impact. As he’s choking her, all he can think about is all the nights he laid in Darius’ bunk and held his hand, praying that there were days ahead of them where they could do this all the time. It pisses him off even more when he thinks about how his prayers never came true, and how he spent so much time doting on Mariah that he never reached out and grabbed Darius’ hand when it was right there.

He’s pinning her down to her desk when he hears a faint voice calling to him from the back of his mind. The sound is from an alleyway afterschool, over 20 years ago. It’s the voice of a kid with a big afro and his shoulders squared, telling the boys messing with a young Hernan to leave him alone.

_Hernan didn’t understand a word he said, but he remembers how surprised he was that this brave, tiny kid with a big smile came to his rescue._

_Once the boys finally cleared, the kid took a step forward. “What they beating you up for?”_

_Hernan watched his mouth move. Nothing he said really made sense to him, but it was amusing in the way he said it._

_“Oh. You don’t speak English, huh?” The kid paused. “Me llamo Darius! Uh, como estas?”_

_Hernan remembers how happy he was that someone was trying to talk to him, no matter how busted their Spanish may be._

_“Estoy bien,” Hernan smiled. “Gracias.”_

The memory loosens his grip on Mariah’s throat. She’s so shocked that she doesn’t even try to get up, and he’s left staring at her empty eyes.

“You ain’t even worth the effort. You’re pathetic,” he says, and he turns around and leaves without listening to any of her pleas for him to come back. He feels proud of himself for once, for being able to walk away.

He goes straight outside and marches to Detective Knight. He sees the surprise and confusion on her face when he tells her that he’s turning himself in, but none of that really matters to him. He just wants to get in the car and look at the city through the eyes of a man who’s lost his whole world, and shit, that’s how he made Darius feel for all that time. The thought stings more than anything Hernan’s ever felt, but his wish gets granted, for once in his life, and the car ride is quiet as he looks at Harlem without the danger of someone sneaking up on him for once.

In the distance, he can see Manhattan Bridge. The sight makes him think about Ridenhour and Darius, but he’s always thinking about Darius lately, so nothing there is new enough to take his mind off the constant empty feeling in his chest.

Detective Knight makes eye contact with him through her rearview mirror and, for a second, she almost looks like she feels bad for him.

But the second is just that, and she looks away as he brings his attention back to the view from his window.

He solemnly watches the Manhattan Bridge pass by, and he prays for the first time in a while. He prays that Darius went somewhere far from New York, that he at least went out of state where the news of Hernan’s death won’t reach him. He imagines Darius holding a local newspaper to his chest, where an article is going on about the local shooting of an unknown gangster related to the now infamous Diamondback, and he tries to imagine all these different scenarios of Darius’ life once Hernan is no more. In one of them, Darius laughs at the news article, and it’s a sad and broken thing, and he calls his mama to ask how she’s doing. He’s distracting himself. In another, he goes to the morgue and demands to see Hernan’s body. In the worst one, he’s sitting at a table on Coney Island and staring out at the water, dressed in his Sunday-best. It’s funeral attire.

In the best one, however, Darius doesn’t hear the news at all. He’s moved somewhere far from the East Coast, and maybe he has a boyfriend who loves him, but not as much as Hernan does. Or did. But the guy’s able to be with him and be by his side, out in the open and happy all the while, and Darius would’ve never gotten that with Hernan.

That’s the scenario Hernan wants for Darius. He wants it so bad, a tear falls onto his lap.

When the streetlamps of the city start to blur together, he tips his head downward, closes his eyes, and keeps praying the whole way to the station.

* * *

I AM WHO I AM.

The days start to pass a little slower. Hernan hides out in a raggedy apartment in Spanish Harlem and all he can do is miss Darius. He spends his time padding through the empty streets of Harlem at night, trying to get views of Harlem’s Paradise from a distance, just to check if the lights are still on. He entertains the idea of visiting Darius’ mom, but the thought alone is too painful. He can’t imagine sitting across from her without telling her how much he loves her son-even though she probably already knows, and probably always knew, too. She’d probably say some shit about the way Hernan looked at him and how it was almost like he was scared to leave his side, and it’d all be true.

Hernan lays on his little futon and stares up at the ceiling. He’s still scared to leave Darius’ side, even though he’s already done it.

This is life without Darius. And it should feel a little warmer, because Hernan was without Darius for years, years of Diamondback and Cottonmouth and hovering around Mariah. But it feels different this time.

And for the first time in months, something starts in Hernan’s chest. A quiet sniff leaks into the air of the apartment, and suddenly a full sob racks his whole body. He’s crying like a bitch and thinking about how much he wishes him and Darius could be the Rivals again, and suddenly he has the startling thought that he’s gonna go out alone. On a dark street somewhere, because he waited too long and put Darius through too much and now he’s gonna be alone in his final hours.

The ache in his chest is finally gone, though it has been since the moment he left the pier, and he finds himself missing it. 

* * *

I CAN’T TRUST ANYBODY ELSE.

A few more days pass and the East coast weather starts getting to Hernan’s head. The cold front sweeping in dredges up all the memories he has of his time at Seagate. Though swamped in Georgia heat, that shithole prison had the nerve to use a run-down A/C unit. Sometimes it’d be so hot that every inmate walked around in their classic white wifebeaters, and as much as it sucked, Hernan always got to see all the muscle groups Che had been working on. Sure, it made him feel even hotter, but the end always justified the means.

But sometimes, the A/C would kick on and never stop running. It’d feel like the whole damn prison was in the middle of the ice age. But it gave an excuse for Hernan to walk a little closer to Che, pretending he was sapping some of his body heat. _“It ain’t gay, it’s practical.”_ He’d say to whoever asked. Che would always laugh at that.

The East coast weather is reminding Hernan of Che’s laugh.

He decides to go for a walk. It’s a stupid idea given how he’s supposed to be in hiding, but he needs to feel more of this weather. He misses the cold.

He’s on the sidewalk besides a basketball court in El Barrio when he sees someone crossing the street towards him in his peripherals. He steps into the flickering light of a nearby street lamp and turns so he can see them head-on. It’s a guy, and he looks to be some lackey of Mariah’s that he’d seen once or twice in Harlem’s Paradise. Hernan takes a brisk step forward as he watches the man pull his piece from inside his coat.

He’s too slow, or maybe Hernan’s too fast after years of this shit, and it only takes a few moments for Hernan to twist his assailant’s arm back. His focus is all on getting the dude to loosen his death grip on the gun, but as he’s trying to pry open the dude’s hand, he feels something poke at his side.

He looks down and sees the guy trying to cut him with a pocketknife. Hernan takes a step back but it’s too late, everything always is, and the guy manages to cut him across his forearm. It’s a tiny scratch compared to the gashes he’d gotten in the past, but it’s enough to throw him off his game. The man is able to free his right arm from Hernan’s grasp and point his gun straight at him again.

Hernan’s already reaching forward to whack the gun out of his hand when he hears heavy footsteps approaching them. Both Hernan and his assailant falter and they look down the sidewalk to see who would run up on a situation like this.

In hindsight, Hernan realizes that only one person would ever risk themselves like that for him; for his indecisive, dumb ass that’s always late to making the right choice. The only person who would wait around to see him make that choice.

It’s Darius, tearing up the sidewalk beneath him as he charges at Hernan’s assailant. He pins the guy down with both his hands up in a matter of seconds, and Hernan takes the opportunity to whisk both the gun and the pocketknife out of his hands. He bends down and sends the knife straight through the dude’s chest-thank God for cold weather that begs Hernan to keep his gloves on-and sends him out for good.

“Cabron,” Darius says under his breath, piercing the now-deceased assailant with his gaze.

Darius is breathing hard as he sits back on his knees and slowly gets back up on his feet. He’s looking at Hernan with the same soft expression he gave him when he first got out of Seagate. Something about it breaks Hernan’s heart and puts it back together all over again, like he should’ve never left him with Ridenhour that night. Or more like he should’ve never left him, ever.

“I thought I told you to get out of New York,” Hernan says, though he can’t manage to level his voice. Something’s fluttering in his chest again and it’s egging on the tears that are welling up in his eyes. 

“I can’t.” Darius pauses, and his eyes are still wide and his mouth downturned. “I can’t leave you. No matter how many times you tell me to or how much you want me to.”

“I don’t want you to.” Hernan says immediately. “I never want you to.”

And he feels dumb, he always feels dumb around Darius, but there’s some guy he doesn’t even know the name of bleeding at their feet and here he is, confessing the shit he’d tried to keep buried in the back of his mind for cold, chilly days. Days that he had planned on ever since he left Darius at that pier, like when he let himself cry for the first time in months, and even nights like these where he wanted to risk his life by walking out in public just so he could remember every piece of Darius he had in his mind. But now he doesn’t have to remember, because Darius is here and he’s real, and he’s somehow even more beautiful than the images Hernan kept in his memories.

Darius smiles at him, finally, but keeps quiet.

“I got an immunity deal. Mariah’s in jail,” Hernan motions at the man lying at their feet. “She’s tryna get rid of me and everyone else who worked for her. You’re not safe here.”

“I’m not safe damn near anywhere, man,” Darius laughs. It’s a rough and hoarse sound, and Hernan has been missing the last time he heard it. “You know that. I know that.”

Hernan takes a step closer because he’s starting to feel a little brave and that ache in his chest came back and now it won’t go away. Besides, it’s cold out; he’s sapping some body heat.

All the old excuses don’t sound the same, but he’s starting to feel glad they don’t.

Darius looks down at him and his smile looks softer, rounder, fuller. “And yet I’m still here.”

Hernan nods.

“You should go before someone else comes after you.” Hernan watches Darius’ adam’s apple bob. “Maybe I won’t be here for that time. Won’t be here to save you.”

Hernan laughs and pushes Darius back, just a little. “I would’ve been fine if you hadn’t showed up.”

“Bullshit.”

“Yeah, ok,” Hernan’s still laughing and now Darius is too. “Yeah. I want you here for that time.”

Darius recovers the space he’d just lost and now they’re back together, the closest they’ve been since Seagate. Chest to chest, laughing like crazed maniacs with a dead man just a foot away from them. Hernan’s still bleeding, and yet he can’t bring himself to care. 

Hernan thinks about what Mariah had asked them, if they had a “brokeback romance” going on or if it was just a fling. As much as he loves that she’s sitting in a jail cell, he wishes she could see him and Che now, see the way Che’s eyes light up whenever he looks at Hernan. He wishes she could see how Hernan can never lie to Che, not forever anyway, and how the truth always comes out just as it is right now.

“I should’ve never let you follow me into the Stokes’ crazy ass business. You should’ve gone straight after Seagate,” Darius snorts at that and, yeah, the irony of the statement isn’t lost on Hernan. But he continues. “But somehow you made it alright. You got back to me alright.”

“I always will,” Darius reaches for Hernan’s hand. It’s the first time they’ve ever done this out where someone could see them. Holding hands and sharing chaste kisses were always reserved for bedrooms when parents weren’t home and dark cells during lights-out at Seagate.

The fluttering feeling in his chest gets stronger. Hernan smiles wider.

“I only gotta survive a day or two more until Mariah finally gets sentenced.”

It’s a proposition, and Darius knows it. He laughs at Hernan’s need to even ask and squeezes Hernan’s hand tighter.

“Let’s get out of here before they come and revoke your immunity deal.”

* * *

WE DON’T HAVE TO BE JUST GANGSTERS.

Darius and Hernan are sitting at a little table on the Coney Island boardwalk with a pen, a notepad they bought at a gift shop, and hot dogs to keep said notepad from flying away. Darius couldn’t stop laughing when Hernan suggested coming here as a sort of “reparations for letting your mama beat the shit out of you”, as Hernan put it, for stealing hot dogs nearly two decades ago. Everything Darius wanted today was on him. And just to be a dick about it, he made Hernan buy him 5 hot dogs.

“You’re not even gonna eat all of them!” Hernan was fussing over it even though they were already in front of the cashier.

“Yeah, but I took all of that ass-whooping, so,” Darius looked to the cashier, “5 hot dogs. Actually, 4 and make that last one a brat.”

Hernan rolled his eyes-Darius loved seeing them without sunglasses obscuring them-and reached for his wallet.

Darius takes a bite out of his bratwurst and looks over the few things they have jotted down on the first page of the notepad.

_expedite passports - > get passports -> get the fuck outta new york_

It was a brisk read.

“So,” Darius starts, “Where should we go once we ‘get the fuck outta New York’?”

Hernan chuckles. “How about somewhere sunny?”

“Corny ass.”

“I wasn’t kidding when I said I cry watching This Is Us.” Hernan says. “We spent years in Georgia and every second of it was behind bars. Couldn’t see any sunshine then, so let’s see some now.”

Darius shrugs. “You wanna go back to Georgia?”

“Hell no.” Hernan kicks his foot under the table. “We’re never going back there. We should go somewhere sunny that’s not Georgia.” He pauses. “Preferably a place without all them super freaks like Luke Cage.”

“They all here in New York, man.”

“I heard they might start moving out west,” Hernan says. “Oh shit.”

“What?” Darius asks, sitting up.

“Don’t laugh, but I feel like I’m just now realizing we’re a ‘same-sex couple’ or whatever.”

Darius laughs anyway, and just for that Hernan takes one of his hot dogs and bites into it, ignoring Darius’ “hey!”

“I’m saying it because I just realized we can’t go to Texas or anything like that ‘cause we can’t do shit like this there,” Hernan clarifies. “Shit. Should we just move out west then?”

Darius’ laugh grows louder and Hernan wants to kick his foot again, but he can’t stop watching Darius’ chest rise and fall and the way his hair twists bounce up and down with it. Yeah, he _definitely_ wants to be somewhere where he can watch Che like this out in the open and not get socially castrated for it. He’s spent too many years hiding in the closet to let this next move pass him by.

Once Darius regains himself, he sits back up and wipes a few tears from his eyes. “You wanna be like one of those twink-ass couples out in Cali?”

“Nah!” It’s Hernan’s turn to laugh. “We’re gangsters.”

“Ex-gangsters.” Darius chimes in.

“We’ve been on gang shit our whole lives,” Hernan amends. “We’ve killed people. We’ve been to prison. I don’t think we could be twinks if we tried.”

Darius nods.

“But, it would be nice to be somewhere that we could be more open in public. Have neighbors that won’t be disgusted by us. The whole nine yards.”

“Yeah, but we’re gangsters. Ex-gangsters.” Darius laughs. “I look like the damn poster child for a school-to-prison pipeline article and you look like you’re gonna misspeak in Starbucks and get ICE called on you. We’re always gonna find people that are disgusted by us, whether it’s ‘cause we like men or look like we beat up men.”

“True,” Hernan concedes.

He looks over at the hot dog stand where, 20 years or so ago, he lead Darius in one of his favorite heists that he’s ever committed. He remembers how all he wanted was to hold his hand, even when they were running away with hot dog juice sitting in their pockets. It should’ve been gross, or at least a little scary, but nothing could shake that feeling that Hernan’s hand belonged in Darius’.

He thinks about how he’s wanted to hold Darius’ hand for 20 years.

“I’m gonna hold your hand no matter where we move, then.” Hernan admits with a small smile on his face. “’Cause if years of being a criminal has taught us anything, it’s that people are always gonna try and take us out or put us down.”

He pauses to look at Darius with all the love in the world, because he has it. He has it right there on Coney Island, and he’ll have it on their plane ride to wherever they’re going, and he’ll have it there too. He’ll always have it as long as Darius is by his side.

“But if years of knowing each other has taught us anything,” Hernan smiles. “It’s that rivals.”

“We ain’t got none.”

The two men cross their right arm over their chest and grin at each other. The notepad flies away, but it’s okay.

They know where to go from here.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I really, really, REALLY love the relationship dynamic (that could've been explored more in canon) between Shades and Comanche. I wrote this so I could explore it more myself. I think there's a severe lack of ShadyChe fics too, and since I'm super happy about there being new LGBT+ characters in the MCU (and for them to be POC!!), I decided I'd do my part to help! 
> 
> Also I haven't posted a fic in like three years so this is kinda my return to it. I'm thinking about making a sequel to this where we can see Hernan and Darius continuing to live the life they deserve. :)
> 
> Thank you for reading!


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